Traditionally, in the museum exhibit industry, businesses have either been design-only or fabrication-only. Taylor Studios, for instance, was founded in 1991 as a fab-only firm. By the mid-to-late-nineties clients were asking us to design for them, too. Sometimes they wanted us to design from scratch or to reconfigure a previous designer’s work. We officially made the switch to design-build after the turn of the century (that sounds weird doesn’t it?!).

Because we’ve been design-build for so long, I’m taken aback sometimes when I hear someone say they don’t know what design-build is. More often, however, I encounter people who merely don’t understand what it really means. So, for those of you who may be questioning what it is, the pros and cons, why we chose to be design-build, etc. we’ve tackled these topics in a series of blogs I'll list for you at the end. But first, what is design-build?

Design-Bid-Build vs. Design-Build

Design-bid-build is the more traditional way of contracting construction projects including exhibits for nature centers and museums. In this situation, you will have at least two separate contracts for your exhibit project. The first contract will be with the designer. Once the designer completes their portion of the work, the design package will go out to bid. Then you’ll negotiate a second contract with the fabricator. Sometimes, people hire a third party to help coordinate all these moving parts, which adds a third contract to the mix.

In design-build situations, you will only have one contract for the entire project and one main point of contact. Sometimes, these contracts are a partnership between a designer and a fabricator and other times, it is a design-build firm that does everything from planning to design to fabrication in-house. It’s a good idea to know upfront who will be doing the actual work (i.e. a partnership or a single firm).

Only Smaller Institutions Do Design-Build though, Right?

Wrong. Design-build is becoming the norm. Years ago when we made the switch, Betty was ridiculed for this decision. I think we were expected to fall on our faces, but that didn’t happen. Quite the contrary actually. The National Park Service eventually began using the design-build approach as did many other agencies and institutions. The majority of sites we see that have to use the design-bid-build approach (usually against the will of the site staff) are those run by municipalities. You see, exhibit services are still regarded by some as “commodities” which they are not, but describing it as anything but to most purchasing people is an uphill battle.

That’s it

Now that you have a better understanding of what design-build is, here are a few more blogs that dive deeper:

The Buck Stops Here

Is There Really a Process for Design-Build Projects?

This blog was originally posted in February, 2015.